The ferry company P&O will not be the subject of criminal proceedings for the brutal dismissal of 800 employees which had caused an outcry in the country, the British authorities have indicated.
“After a full and robust criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the employees terminated by P&O Ferries, we have concluded that we will not pursue criminal proceedings,” an Insolvency Service spokesperson said in a statement released on Friday.
This government agency is responsible, among other things, for prosecuting offenders on behalf of the Ministry of Enterprise. A civil investigation is still ongoing.
The company had laid off 800 seafarers overnight on March 17 to replace them with outsourced workers paid well below the British minimum wage. P&O kept saying its cost model was unsustainable and the company, hit hard by the pandemic and the collapse in international travel, was losing £100m a year.
The general secretary of Nautilus International, a union that represents seafarers, Mark Dickinson, called the decision not to prosecute P&O “deeply disappointing” adding that it “will be met with frustration and anger by the 786 sailors and their families who have been so cruelly rejected by P&O Ferries”.
He pointed out that this announcement comes “after the parent company of P&O Ferries announced record profits”. A government spokesman also regretted the move, telling the BBC that “given their very bad behaviour, it is very disappointing that the company is not facing criminal charges”.
